‘Literature review on the analysis of climate change risks in the environmental impact assessment of dams’

ABSTRACT

Climate change is a current concern in our society, with consequences increasingly felt worldwide. Alongside territories and communities, large infrastructures such as dams may be vulnerable to climate change and need to be resilient to related impacts. Consequently, their approval should require a comprehensive assessment of associated climate change risks. This concern is addressed by several international guidelines that suggest incorporating the evaluation of climate change risks in the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) process to overcome it. It is also evidenced in several national EIA regulations updated accordingly. Based on a systematic review of scientific literature published in the last twenty years, this paper explores how has the scientific community addressed the integration of climate change risks in the EIA of dams. The findings show that the potential of EIA to address climate change risks is widely acknowledged. However, published systematic studies assessing how the analysis of these risks is being included in dams’ EIA current practice, are rare. This gap suggests a research potential around the topic and a new niche for research.

KEYWORDS:

• Climate change
• dams
• environmental impact assessment

1. Introduction

Climate change has various impacts on our health, ecosystems, and economy (European Environment Agency 2017), with consequences felt worldwide (European Commission 2013). They include wide-ranging changes in average climate and more extreme weather that will result in sea-level rise, more intense heatwaves, flooding, droughts, to name a few (European Environment Agency 2017). These impacts vary between regions, depending on climate, geographic and socio-economic conditions, and some areas are more at risk than others (Climate-Adapt 2020). Therefore, it is essential to understand specific vulnerabilities and threats and deal with climate impacts combined with other environmental, social, and economic factors (McCallum 2013).

The connection between climate change and dams has been studied in various perspectives. One relates to the variability of the future climate change scenarios and its implications to assess their effects on dams (Kite 2001; Christensen and Lettenmaier 2007; Palmer et al. 2008; Zhai and Tao 2017). Another relates to the assessment of greenhouse emissions associated with the reservoirs and their contribution to exacerbate climate change (Samiotis et al. 2018; Arias et al. 2019). The design of mitigation measures under these complexities is also a concern (Samiotis et al. 2018; Arias et al. 2019). Nevertheless, dams can provide climate change adaptation opportunities, especially in some regions of the globe (Jenkins et al. 2011; Watts et al. 2011; Kingsford 2011; Moore et al. 2012). Additionally, along with territories and communities, dams are also vulnerable to climate change. Consequently, impact assessment and approval processes of new dams must assure that they can cope with climate change challenges (European Commission 2013).

Dams have played an important role in regions’ social and economic development, especially in developing countries. They are built with purposes of water security, energy supply, and flood protection (Barbarossa et al. 2020). They also have significant impacts on river ecosystems and habitats, flow regimes, water quality, atmosphere through greenhouse gases and on socio-economic features of human communities, to name a few. Despite the associated controversy due to their environmental impacts, and the increasing movements against them, they are still being considered and implemented. According to current estimates, there are around 58,700 large dams worldwide (ICOLD General synthesis 2020) with an estimated cumulative storage capacity of between 7,000–8,300 km3 (Mulligan et al. 2020).

Dams are structures with long lifespans and typically designed according to past climate conditions (Rydgren et al. 2007). Dams may be exposed to different climatic conditions other than those initially designed during their lifetime. An increase in water flow due to climate change can increase sedimentation and erosion, threatening the dam lifespan and amplifying flood risk and dam breaches or failure (Palmer et al. 2008). Reducing the water flow may increase water temperatures and deteriorate water quality (Van Soesbergen 2013). Thus, climate change can impair the dam’s performance and longevity, increasing its vulnerability to failure, but can also alter the surrounding environment and aggravate the nature and magnitude of the environmental impacts generated by it (Wentz 2015).

A dam sensitivity depends on its physical type, the operational function of its reservoir (Van Soesbergen 2013) and the current and foreseen climatic conditions of its geographic location (Engineers Canada 2016). In the face of climate change, most dams will probably face issues related to the safety of their spillways (more extreme flows exceeding the design flow, increase of debris and vegetation), yield and reliability of the reservoirs (changing of streamflow patterns and extreme rainfall-runoff events), erosion and reservoir sedimentation, which might reduce the dam lifespan and amplify flood risks, dam failure, and breaches. Additionally, a combination of increased erosion, water fluctuations, and prolonged drought may take advantage of existing flaws in the dam’s main structure and challenge its design and construction methods. In this case, embankment dams are probably more vulnerable to climate change than concrete and masonry dams (Atkins 2013). If the variations of climate conditions are not considered during project design, this may increase the dams’ failure possibilities in the future. Hence vulnerability analysis and risk assessments for new dams are essential. Moreover, the re-evaluation of dams around the world is also required (Bates et al. 2008) since its initial design could have been based on parameters that might no longer be valid now or are at the end of its lifespan. However, performing these assessments during the initial project development stages may be challenging.

EIA is a systematic process that evaluates the potential environmental consequences of activities and projects. It was first introduced by the United States of America, in 1969, through the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and it is considered one of the more successful policy innovations of the last century (Sadler 1996), currently used worldwide. EIAs assists with the understanding of environmental and social consequences of projects (Byer et al. 2018), enhancing any potential benefits (Sok et al. 2012) and it is a tool in which many governments rely on to inform the development of environmental decision‐making (Wood, 2003). EIA is firmly established in the planning process of projects and, in recent years, the adaptation of its process has significantly evolved to include new roles and responsibilities, new ‘theatres of practice’. Currently, it is possible to find discussions among the scientific community that relate to the structure of EIA in terms of its regulatory framework for specific renewable energy developments of such as offshore wind farms (Salvador et al. 2018; Hall et al. 2020), hydropower (Hamududu and Killingtveit 2012) or marine renewable energies (Soria-Rodriguez, 2020). Additionally, there is a big discussion around how EIA regulatory frameworks can evolve to include new political circumstances (Elvan 2018) or adapt to include climate change (Enriquez-de-Salamanca et al., 2016; Jiricka-Pürrer et al. 2018; Gao 2018). The appropriateness of EIA to tackle climate change impacts (Larsen 2014; Gao 2018; Jiricka-Pürrer et al. 2019; Preston 2020) also remains a source of concern.

EIA is considered a useful tool for assessing climate change risks (Sadler 1996), enhancing the resilience of new projects (Agrawala et al., 2010, p.33; Sok et al. 2012; Byer et al. 2018). In this context, guidelines, and recommendations on how to integrate climate change risks in EIA, seconding the potential advantages of this procedure, were published in several international and national settings (FPTCCCEA, 2003; CARICOM & SPREP, 2004; Nova Scotia Environment, 2013; Montgomery et al. 2015). In the European Union (EU) context, a guide to integrate climate change into environmental impact assessment has also been published. Specific requirements were also included in a Directive (2014/52/EU) to be implemented by the member states. Consequently, EIA national legal frameworks have also evolved to reflect these requirements.

Nevertheless, difficulties in implementing these guidelines on specific projects have been pointed out (Agrawala et al., 2010), suggesting that the process of incorporating climate change risks into an EIA process still needs to be matured (Yi and Hacking 2011). In this context, some authors suggest that EIA might not be the correct tool to accommodate climate change, arguing that EIA’s primary purpose is to inform rather than influence decision-making (Weston 2000). Others say that the EIA process suffers from weak conceptual foundations that restrict its practical effectiveness (Cashmore et al. 2004; Lawrence 1997 in Smart et al. 2014). It is also mentioned that the planning stages depend on ideologies and behaviours that can make the EIA process inherently political (Nilsson and Dalkmann 2001). Still, that potential knowledge gaps and lack of transparency make the process highly subjective, leading to inconsistent or biased decision making (Bond and Pope 2012). Besides, the uncertainties around the science of climate change itself (Smart et al. 2014) and the low user-friendly climate change information (Agrawala et al., 2010) may also explain the practitioners’ difficulties when addressing climate change in projects.

Given the complexity of dams regarding their climate-related impacts and vulnerabilities, and the growing concern about the integration of climate change in the EIA processes, evidenced by the adoption of guidelines and regulations in various countries, it becomes relevant to disclose how is the scientific community studying the inclusion of climate change risks in the EIA of dams. For this purpose, a literature review can reveal the attention given by the scientific community. It may also bring to the fore the concerns raised about integrating climate change on the EIA of dams, how the follow-up of implementing the international guidelines and regulations is being considered and with which results. This article undertakes a systematic review of scientific articles published in the last twenty years, with the primary aim of finding systematic studies about the practice of incorporating climate change risks in the EIAs of dams. The review also analyses the evolution of the number of publications, location and regions of focus, degree of correlation between authors and their main research topics.

The following section provides the methodology, including the criteria for the identification, selection, and analysis of the papers: the third section presents the review findings. The fourth section discusses the results in light of the objectives and the method used, and the fifth section concludes the article and suggests topics for further research.

2. Methodology

The literature review was performed on a set of peer-reviewed papers published in scientific journals between 2000 and 2019 and referenced in Scopus. It was assumed that the sample would be representative of the scientific community publishing on the research topic. The literature review exercise has been structured according to the following steps:

a) Selection of articles: search of articles referenced by the Scopus database (in January 2020) covering ‘environmental impact assessment’ and ‘climate change’ and ‘dams’ or ‘reservoirs’. Only peer-reviewed articles published in journals and English between January 2000 and December 2019 were included. The terms were searched in the title, abstract and content fields of the articles. Under this step, 106 articles were identified.

b) Screening of articles: The titles and abstracts of the articles were screened, removing the ones that were not relevant to the research topic. Under this step, 82 articles were selected.

c) Preliminary reading: The contents of the articles were checked to determine the relevance for this research to remove the second batch of irrelevant articles. Under this step, 63 articles were selected for full content analysis.

d) Analysis of the selected articles: the articles were imported into a database created in Mendeley (2014), and their bibliographic information verified. The entire content of the articles was then analysed, considering:

- the frequency of papers published during the timespan considered to assess if the interest of the scientific community has increased over time;

- the broad location of the authors to understand where in the world the research topic is attracting attention;

- the co-citations among the articles (using the software VOSviewer) to assess if the authors constitute an interlinked, clustered, or scattered community; and

- the research topics to understand under which perspectives the integration of climate change in EIA processes of dams are being treated by the scientific community.

The results of the systematic literature review are presented in the following section.

3. Results

As mentioned in the previous section, the systematic literature review focused on the 63 articles selected. A chronological analysis of these articles shows that except for one article published in 2001, all other articles were published after 2006 (see Figure 1). Between 2007 and 2014, the number of articles published shows some variations, while after 2015 onwards, there is a significant increase reaching eight to nine papers a year after 2016. The highest number of articles are from the United States of America (USA) and China (see Figure 2). Other articles worth mention are from Australia, Brazil, Canada, and the United Kingdom (UK).

Figure 1. Chronological evolution of the articles

Figure 2. Geographical distribution of the analysed articles

The most cited articles are from Palmer et al. (2008), Christensen and Lettenmaier (2007), and Brown et al. (2009), all from the American group of articles. These authors focus on using climate and hydrological models to simulate the impacts of climate change on water resources under different climate scenarios. Among the most cited papers from China are the ones of Xu et al. (2013), Hu et al. (2016), and Zhai and Tao (2017), which focus on the implications of climate change on the management of river catchments in China and on the hydrological regimes of Chinese rivers. The most cited articles from Australia are from Kingsford (2011) and Watts et al. (2011), both mentioning the importance of re-evaluating dam operations to assist with the adaptation to climate change and help restore the ecosystems. From Brazil, the article of Caetano De Souza (2008) evaluates the environmental impacts of hydroelectric dams employing environmental indexes, referring them as essential instruments in EIA studies to enable the optimization of future dam design and operations. From Canada, Brandão et al. (2013) mention that consensus on how to consider climate change on impact assessment tools such as Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Carbon Footprinting (CF) still needs to be achieved, recommending further studies on this matter. From the UK, the article of Kite (2001) develops a model to simulate the hydrological cycle of the Mekong and its tributaries (in the presence of dams), referring that the model is useful for EIA studies when trying to assess climate change impacts on water resources.

The analysis of the co-citations among the articles identified in this literature review was performed using the VOSviewer software tool¹ (see Figure 3). For this purpose, a map of the number of citations and their relations was built within this specific group of articles. Broadly, the figure shows that there is a weak interconnectedness among the papers identified, and inherently, among the authors, given the low levels of citation among them.

Figure 3. Relation between the selected group of articles

The prime connected group is associated with the article Palmer et al. (2008), as represented in Figure 4. The article ‘Climate change and the world’s river basins: anticipating management options’ (Palmer et al. 2008) is cited in the articles of Kingsford (2011), Jenkins et al. (2011), and Watts et al. (2011) (see red lines in Figure 4) and in the articles of Moore et al. (2012), Fu et al. (2015) and Danner et al. (2017) (see green lines in Figure 4). The first group of authors related to the work in Palmer et al. (2008) focuses on the Australian river basins and agrees with the importance of adjusting the dam’s operations to cope with climate change as an adaptation strategy. The second group of articles focuses on the study of climate change assessments on river catchments impacted by dams explaining how climate change-driven effects may influence these structures’ operational performance.

Figure 4. Connections between a group of articles around Palmer et al. (2008)

The analysis of the contents of the articles enabled the identification of four main topics of concerns in the field, namely:

i) Analysis of Climate Change Impacts: includes studies with generic and case study analysis of climate change impacts on river catchments in the presence of dams;

ii) Impact Assessment Methodologies: discusses the use of different impact assessment methodologies to assess and manage climate change impacts;

iii) Impacts of Dams and Reservoirs on Climate Change: explores several case studies of dams and its impacts; and

iv) Climate Change Adaptation Strategies: explores the possibilities provided by dams and the optimization of its operations as an adaption strategy to cope with climate change.

The themes are interrelated, and some overlap exists. Table 1 summarizes the contributions of the prominent authors identified in the literature review with relevant recommendations for integrating climate change on impact assessment of dams. The following paragraphs systematize their contents regarding the research question of this paper.

Table 1: Summary of the prominent authors and their recommendations

Analysis of climate change impacts

The articles dealing with the analysis of climate change impacts tend to focus on the use of climate models, which, combined with hydrological models, simulate the responsive behaviour of river basins in terms of their hydrological regime and runoff (Kite 2001; Christensen and Lettenmaier 2007; Palmer et al. 2008; Zhai and Tao 2017), sedimentation loads (Zhao et al. 2018), ecology (Fu et al. 2015), irrigation (Fazel et al. 2017) and hydropower capacity (Majone et al. 2016) in different future climate scenarios.

The most cited article, Palmer et al. (2008), uses hydro-climate models with data on impounded rivers, impacts of dams, and projected river discharges to create different scenarios and investigate the consequences of changes in climate and human population in several major world river basins (dam-impacted and unimpacted basins). Christensen and Lettenmaier (2007) also uses a multimodel approach and the outputs of global climate models to study the implications of climate change in the Colorado river basin. Authors such as Kite (2001), Fujihara et al. (2008), Tung et al. (2009), Peel et al. (2015), Anandhi et al. (2016), Danner et al. (2017), Rungee and Kim (2017), Lee and Huang (2017), Liu et al. (2018) and Gorguner et al. (2019) apply the same methods and present studies in different parts of the globe. Hu et al. (2016) present a model (FABM-PCLake) that enables the simulation of hydrodynamic processes until three-dimensional heterogeneous environments, supporting its application in climate change impact assessment studies.

Majone et al. (2012) use an ensemble of six regional climate models to derive projected changes in precipitation and temperature, which used on a hydrological model allow to examine climate change scenarios for the Gállego river basin (a tributary of the Ebro river) in Spain. The same type of approach is used by the author in the south-eastern Alpine region (Majone et al. 2016) to infer the potential consequences of climate change on this region’s hydropower potential. Other authors that used regional climate models include Kara and Yucel (2015), Chilkoti et al. (2017), Sarzaeim et al. (2017), Aslam et al. (2018), Liu et al. (2018), Forrest et al. (2018), Nauman et al. (2019).

Impact assessment methodologies

The articles dealing with this topic identify mainly two types of formal impact assessment methodologies, namely life-cycle assessment (Brandão et al. 2013; Gracey and Verones 2016; Kayo and Noda 2018; Verán-Leigh and Vázquez-Rowe 2019) and EIA (Boyer-Villemaire et al. 2013; Xu et al. 2013; Grumbine and Pandit 2013). Other methods used to assess climate change impacts are also mentioned in Thorne and Fenner (2011). The authors develop a climate change impact assessment’ tool (SCIAT) to ‘translate climate change projections into “real world” impacts’ and to assess the impacts of climate change on reservoir water quality and water treatment plant operations.

When discussing EIA as an impact assessment methodology, some authors highlight the benefits of this tool to tackle climate change impacts, referring it as a valuable prevention tool, and stressing the need to include the interaction between climate change risks and dams in the existing EIA regulatory framework (Moser et al. 2019; Ulibarri and Scott 2019). Nevertheless, two authors presented cases where EIA could be improved, questioning its effectiveness to tackle climate change risks:

a) Xu et al. (2013) discusses the Environmental Impact Statement for the Three Gorges Project in 1992 and suggests the following improvements in future EIA of dams: 1) strategic environmental assessments should be preferred in projects where individual EIAs are unable to provide an analysis of the full spectrum of cumulative impacts; 2) national planning policies need to be adjusted; 3) long-term monitoring systems and cross-impacts of climate change between dams identified.

b) Grumbine and Pandit (2013) discuss the case of the Himalayan hydropower dam-building program from the Government of India, highlighting issues such as the: 1) cumulative and transboundary impacts; 2) conflicts and lack of national institutional accountability; 3) inefficient use of international standards; 4) weak public and stakeholder participation and 5) lack of certification of private consultants to perform EIA.

Impacts of dams and reservoirs on climate change

The articles dealing with this topic generally discus the specific environmental impacts caused by dams and its contribution to climate change through the emission of greenhouse gases emission from its reservoirs. The most cited author in this group is Brown et al. (2009) which presents a comprehensive analysis of the impacts generated during the construction phase of a dam and proposes a tool (Integrative Dam Assessment Modelling tool (IDAM)) to integrate all these into a cost-benefit analysis that would allow for a more informed and transparent decision-making process. The author states that ‘(…) the IDAM tool allows decision-makers to evaluate alternatives and articulate priorities associated with a dam project, making the decision process about dams more informed and more transparent’ representing ‘an important evolutionary step in dam evaluation’. Caetano De Souza (2008) evaluates the impacts caused by hydroelectric power plants in Brazil using environmental indexes that, according to the author, ‘could be utilized as important instruments for environmental impact assessments’. Under this theme, other authors discuss the impacts of dams and the contribution of greenhouse emissions by the reservoirs in different contexts such as the in the Mekong floodplains (Arias et al. 2019), in the Mediterranean region (Samiotis et al. 2018), or the impacts of reservoirs on the streamflow and sediment loads in the Hanjiang River in China (Qian et al. 2016) and runoff under climate change caused by the Nierji Reservoir also in China (Men et al. 2019).

Climate change adaptation strategies

Articles dealing with this topic stress the sensitiveness of dams and reservoirs to climate change. A few articles alert for the need to re-evaluate existing dams and re-design new resilient dams as an essential adaptation opportunity in some regions of the globe (Jenkins et al. 2011; Watts et al. 2011; Kingsford 2011; Moore et al. 2012). The most cited research study about this subject is from Kingsford (2011). The author underlines that dams’ periodical maintenance provides an opportunity to assess whether such structures still meet their purposes and that, in some cases, ‘altering its operations may constitute a clear opportunity for proactive conservation of rivers, given the uncertainties around impacts of climate change’. Watts et al. (2011) focus on dam re-operation strategies in arid climates with high water demands, referring to a ‘broad scope of adaptation strategies’ provided by existing infrastructures that can be adapted to mitigate climate impacts. Jenkins et al. (2011) use a selection of rivers and wetlands from Oceania (Australia, New Zealand, and Pacific Islands) to explore the main threats and adaptation opportunities to climate change in different ecosystems and concluding that dam management operations can be extended to adapt to climate change.

4. Discussion

This paper analysed how the international scientific community is studying the incorporation of climate change risks into the EIAs of dams and particularly on EIA related practice. For that purpose, a literature review based on peer-reviewed articles published in scientific journals referenced in the Scopus database was carried out. The choice of terms was broad enough to allow the identification of a representative number of articles. However, this may constitute a limitation to this review, as a broader group of literature could have possibly been attained from other combinations of words. The use of other platforms such as Web of Science could have enlarged the number of articles selected. The inclusion of books and conference papers could have also enlarged the sample, but as peer review processes do not necessarily cover these, they were not considered.

The chronological analysis of the selected articles shows a crescendo in the number of articles published with the highest number of articles published from 2015 onwards. The articles’ geographic distribution shows that the leading groups of authors discussing these matters are from the USA and China, but publications from Brazil, Australia, and the United Kingdom start to emerge. Although with a few overlaps, the review enabled the identification of four primary topics of concern dealt with by the articles relevant to the research question of this paper. These are the analysis of climate change impacts, impact assessment methodologies, impacts of dams and reservoirs on climate change and, climate change adaptation strategies.’

The concerns referred under the topics ‘analysis of climate change impacts’ and ‘impact assessment methodologies’ primarily focus on the study of the behaviour of river basins with dams in the presence of different climate scenarios and impacts, as well as on the use of different methodologies to assess the significance of these impacts and propose relevant mitigation measures. Under the first topic, the most significant contribution comes from Palmer et al. (2008) that provides a general but fundamental conclusion that the basins impacted by dams require a higher number of management actions to mitigate climate change impacts than the basins with free-flowing rivers. Under the second topic is Brandão et al. (2013) contribution, who states that formal impact assessment methodologies like life-cycle analysis and cost-benefit analysis are useful tools to assess climate change impacts. EIA was also considered a useful tool to assess climate change impacts by authors such as Moser et al. (2019). However, a few authors mentioned cases where related processes lack objectivity or need improvement (Xu et al. 2013; Grumbine and Pandit 2013).

Under the topic of ‘impacts of dams and reservoirs on climate change’ are the analyses of the impacts of dams and reservoirs on climate change through specific case studies around the globe. Here it is worth to outline the relevance of using modelling to integrate the various perspectives associated with dam construction which provides a visual scheme to represent the various costs and benefits associated with it as recommended by Brown et al. (2009). This author advocates that the tool allows a more informed and transparent decision process when considering dams’ costs and benefits in a climate change scenario.

Finally, acknowledging the sensitivity of dams to climate change, under the topics of ‘climate change adaptation strategies’, the authors highlight that climate change might also have an impact on dams, and there is probably a need to re-evaluate these structures in order to prepare them to cope with the future uncertainties of climate change. So, dams might also present a certain degree of vulnerability to climate change due to a change in the conditions for which they were initially designed alongside territories and communities. Likewise, today’s design parameters might no longer be valid at the end of a dam’s lifespan. The authors with articles under this topic often conclude that the potential re-evaluation of dams design and operation activities required worldwide can also be seen as an adaptation opportunity (Jenkins et al. 2011; Watts et al. 2011; Kingsford 2011; Moore et al. 2012).

This literature review showed that articles published before 2010 focused on the study of climate change impacts and its mitigation i.e., impacts of climate change on rivers with dams, and on how the presence of dams would enhance climate change impacts. After 2010, articles about adaptation strategies start to emerge, and the analysis of impacts from a vulnerability and risk perspective, related to dams, also starts to be referred. In this context, the relation between dams and climate change, the vulnerability of structures to climate change, the challenges faced by dams in a changing climate scenario, how can they cope with its risks, overcome its uncertainties, and successfully adapt, are explored. Consequently, the importance of re-evaluating the design, operation, and management of dams as an adaptation strategy to climate change is understood as necessary with future socio-economic and environmental benefits. This goal could potentially be obtained through a comprehensive climate change vulnerability and risk analysis under an EIA procedure, but very few authors were found to explore the use of an EIA methodology in their research to address climate change. Under this context, the idea of addressing uncertainties and hazards caused by climate change in an impact assessment systematic methodology is addressed by Tormey (2010). Moser et al. (2019) add that the interaction between climate change and large infrastructure projects should be required in EIA legal procedures. Ulibarri and Scott (2019) further suggest that a successful adaptation of structures to climate change requires an institutional change and significant shifts in norms and practices.

Despite the expectations risen around the potential benefits of EIA as a tool to address climate change (evidenced by the publication of international guidelines and by the subsequent update of national EIA regulations), the literature review undertaken reveals that no systematic studies in the form of scientific articles dedicated to critically analyse the consequent practice of EIA and how climate change issues are being considered in the EIA of dams were published. Hence, the findings of the literature review indicate a research gap. This may be explained by a group of literature that questions EIA’s ability as an effective tool to accommodate climate change analysis or the uncertainties around the science of climate change (Smart et al. 2014) when applied to complex project-level EIAs. Nevertheless, given i) the wide-spreading adoption of guidelines and regulations at various decision-making levels to force the incorporation of climate change concerns into EIA; ii) the complexity of dams regarding both their vulnerability to climate change impacts and their likelihood to aggravate climate-related impacts and iii) the frequent use of dam project to assess and disseminate practices on EIA, the gap identified in this literature review opens up the way to bring to the fore new research questions that deserve further attention. One question is to understand the reasons behind this gap further. Another question refers to how the national EIA regulatory frameworks integrate climate change concerns, and how they apply to dams. Besides, it should also be questioned how climate change risks of dams are being addressed by EIA studies and at which stages; which are the primary data and methodological concerns and practices; which is the practitioners’ understanding about the inclusion of climate change concerns on EIA of dams, and which obstacles are they facing. Finally, the stakeholders’ understandings about the scope of EIA regarding climate change issues when dams are at stake, should also be studied.

5. Conclusion

Alongside territories and communities, large infrastructures such as dams may be vulnerable to climate change and need to be resilient to related impacts. Therefore, their design and approval should require a comprehensive assessment of associated climate change risks to assess vulnerabilities and prevent dam failure. This concern is addressed by several international guidelines that suggest incorporating the assessment of climate change risks in EIA processes to overcome difficulties, and by national EIA regulations updated accordingly. However, incorporating climate change risks and adaptation strategies during the project development stages can be challenging. The uncertainties around the science of climate change, the intricateness of data and its unequal availability for different regions in the world, and the practitioners’ skills to embrace it in the EIA of complex projects like dams, are examples of the many challenges to be faced. In this context, a few recommendations can be provided such as reviewing the EIA legislation, training of practitioners, dedicated guidelines, and codes of practice on how to include climate change in EIAs of dams. Nevertheless, as mentioned, these recommendations need to be further studied, and this is the subsequent stage of the author’s research. This article studied how the scientific community has analysed the practice of integrating climate change risks in the EIA of dam’ projects. To respond to this, it developed a systematic review of peer-reviewed articles published in scientific journals referenced in Scopus during the last two decades. While the first concerns identified in the literature review were focused on assessing climate change impacts and mitigation measures, a shift to questions related to vulnerability and adaptation to climate change was noticed. Moreover, the EIA potential to address climate change risks was found to be widely acknowledged by the scientific community considered in the analysis undertaken. However, systematic studies published in scientific papers assessing how climate change risks are being integrated into dams’ EIA processes, i.e., in EIA current practice, are scarce. This lack of systematic studies about the integration of climate change of the EIA of dams is surprising. On the one hand, because the EIA scientific community’s increasing attention on climate change, which led to the adoption of guidelines and regulations, should raise concerns on how they are being implemented in practice and the significant constraints. On the other hand, because of the complexity of dams regarding impacts and vulnerabilities climate change-related and their frequent use as case studies for EIA development. This article’s findings indicate a research gap or a research topic that is still in its initial stage and stress the need for further research. The research questions deserving further attention include the following: Why is the scientific community not investigating and presenting case studies about the practice of addressing climate change risks in the EIAs of dams? How are the national EIA regulatory frameworks absorbing climate change issues and dams’ vulnerability to climate change? How are climate change risks of dams being addressed by EIA studies and processes? At which stages? Supported by which type of data? Which are the practitioners’ main challenges when dealing with such a complex topic and the stakeholders’ perspectives?The authors declare that the work described has not been published previously, that it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, that its publication is approved by all authors and tacitly or explicitly by the responsible authorities where the work was carried out, and that, if accepted, it will not be published elsewhere in the same form, in English or in any other language, including electronically without the written consent of the copyright-holder. The authors also declare that there are no conflicts of interest.

Table

Author (s), Date, Case studies and Methodologies	Location	Analysis of climate change impacts	Impact Assessment Methodologies	Impacts of dams on climate change	Climate change adaptation strategies	Recommendations
Ulibarri and Scott (2019) analysed the EIA process for licensing hydropower dams, to assess if the California drought yielded a shift on the analysis of climate resilience	USA		√			A successful adaptation of structures to climate change requires an institutional change and significant shifts in norms and practices
Moser et al. (2019) studies the interaction between climate change and mega-dams in the Amazon forest, predicting an intensification of impacts of large floods	Brazil		√			Interaction between climate change and dams in the EIA regulatory framework of large infrastructure projects should be included
Nauman et al. (2019) uses a multimodel approach under RCP scenarios to quantify climate change impacts in Khanpur Dam	Pakistan	√				Presents strategies for dam future management in the presence of climate change
Verán-Leigh &Vázquez-Rowe (2019) used LCA methodology to assess the impacts of hydropower dams and for calculation of the GHG emissions from the reservoir.	Peru		√			The use of LCA assists decision-making in the energy sector and climate change policymaking
Zhao et al. (2018), reviewed six quantitative methods used to investigate variations in sediment loads within the Loess Plateau	China	√				Assessment of the effects of climate change and human activities on sediment load variation using different methods
Rungee and Kim (2017) uses a multimodel approach to assess the responsive behaviour of Norris Dam to climate change scenarios	USA	√			√	Management of reservoir/dam operations and inherent projection uncertainty should not be neglected
Chilkoti et al. (2017) uses a multimodel approach to assess climate change impacts on hydropower in River Ochlockonee	USA	√				Seasonal variability of water availability due to climate change and marginal increase in energy generation
Danner et al. (2017) examines the case study of Cougar Dam and simulates current reservoir operations under future hydrological and climate scenarios.	USA	√			√	Scenario analysis in impact assessment provides information about how climate change affects the operational performance of dams
Aslam et al. (2018) uses climate models to evaluate the performance of selected adaptation strategies to reduce climate change – southern Punjab area	Pakistan	√			√	Vulnerability assessment and the development of flood protection dams are relevant adaptation strategies to climate change
Kayo and Noda (2018) used LCA to calculate GHG emissions and quantify the climate change mitigation potential present in wooden civil engineering structures	Japan		√			The use of LCA for GHG emission impact assessment provide insights for decision-making in the construction sector
Zhai and Tao (2017) does a model analysis of climate and runoff in 7 Chinese typical catchments to check contributions of climate change and human activities to runoff.	China	√				Despite climate change, water use and management still play an important role in the future water resource conditions
Fazel et al. (2017) studies the flow regimes at hydrological stations before and after major dam construction and irrigation projects in Lake Urmia basin	Finland	√				The effects of human activities, such as increase in water withdrawal, can be major forces in river flow regime changes than climate change
Fu et al. (2015) developed a tool to simulate impacts to habitat condition considering different scenarios of climate change and water developments (e.g., dams, weirs)	Australia	√				This new tool can be used as an integrated tool for assessing climate change impacts on wetland ecosystems
Grumbine and Pandit (2013) explores the example of India’s Himalayan hydropower dam-building program to provide examples of poor planning and EIA malpractice	India		√			Presents several inefficiencies in EIAs such as inefficient analysis of cumulative impacts or lack of certification of private consultants
Xu et al. (2013) discuss the EIA for the Three Gorges Dam Project in 1992	China		√			Recommendations for improvement of future EIAs of dams
Watts et al. (2011) discusses dam re-operation strategies in arid climates	Australia				√	Dam reoperation can assist with adaptation to climate change
Kingsford (2011) analyses conservation-management strategies for wetlands	Australia				√	Re-operation of dams is an opportunity for climate change adaptation
Jenkins et al. (2011) explores threats and adaptation opportunities to climate change in different rivers and wetlands	Oceania				√	Dam management operations can be extended to adapt to climate change
Brown et al. (2009) uses a modelling tool (IDAM) to integrate different perspectives into a cost/benefit analysis of dam impacts	USA			√		IDAM makes an evolutionary step in dam evaluation
Caetano De Souza (2008) evaluates the impact caused by hydroelectric dams in Brazil through the use of environmental indexes	Brazil			√		Environmental indexes are important instruments for environmental impact assessments of more sustainable dams
Fujihara et al. (2008) connects the outputs of GCMs and river basin hydrologic models to explore impacts of climate change on the Seyhan River Basin	Turkey	√				Despite climate change, water use and management still play an important role in the future water resource conditions
Christensen and Lettenmaier (2007) uses a multimodel approach to assess climate change impacts in the Colorado basin – Glen Canyon dam	USA	√				Reservoir storage and average hydropower production generally declined for all periods and emissions scenarios

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

1. This tool used the Scopus database’s bibliographical data to analyze the citations and to create a network visualization of the most cited authors in this group of literature checking eventual relations between them.